The expectation is that Pete Carroll is going to be fired after Sunday’s game against the Chiefs, and the consensus seems to be that the Raiders aren’t going to waste a lot of time before announcing the decision.
League insider Jordan Shultz tweeted on Saturday that Carroll could chose to retire, but that is something Carroll seems to have communicated privately that he does not plan to do.
Once Carroll’s fate in Las Vegas is finalized, the Raiders will turn their focus to finding their next head coach (although privately that is something they have already been doing), and according to Sports Illustrated insider Albert Breer, Tom Brady and GM John Spytek could look to one of their University of Michigan connections for their next head coach.
“At this point, it’d be an upset if Pete Carroll wasn’t one-and-done in Vegas,” Breer reported on Friday.
“His staff, with arranged marriages to coordinators Chip Kelly and Pat Graham, never really jelled like it needed to, and there is an expectation that, with Kelly already gone, the rest of the group will be cleaned out after Sunday’s game against the Chiefs. The next steps will be interesting, with Tom Brady likely to have a big voice, alongside GM John Spytek, on what the franchise looks for.”
“Brady and Spytek’s Michigan connection to Chargers defensive coordinator Jesse Minter, especially given the success of Mike Macdonald in Seattle (Minter and Macdonald worked in Baltimore together, and Minter succeeded Macdonald at Michigan), are worth noting.”
Minter was Michigan’s defensive coordinator for two seasons (2022-2023) and would be an interesting choice if the Raiders draft a quarterback in the first round of this year’s draft.
Minter will be one of the popular candidates in this year’s coaching pool, but conventional wisdom would be to settle on an offensive-minded coach to pair up with Fernando Mendoza or Dante Moore – assuming one of those players ends up in Silver & Black next year.
Moore could still return to Oregon for another season, but Mendoza will be on the board and is expected to be the first player taken in the draft.
If the Raiders have their sights set on Mendoza, a loss to the Chiefs on Sunday will be crucial because the cost to trade up for Mendoza would probably be a couple of first-round picks.
Carroll said this week that it will mean a lot to the locker room for the Raiders to beat their division rivals on Sunday, but the majority of the fan base will be rooting for the Chiefs on Sunday if the Giants don’t beat the Cowboys earlier in the day.
x: @raidersbeat
Minter wouldn’t be horrible but Mike Macdonald was smart enough to bring in Sam Darnold.
Hey how did the Seahawks season go?
No. We need a young offensive minded HC. Teams will only pouch OC once teams are successful and they are left starting over, like the Lions. If we get a HC/OC, like Reid and Shanahan, we have continuity.